


Carolina's Deal with the Devil

by Space_Spazz_101



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Alternate Ending, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, It depends on your definition of happy ending, Maybe happy ending?, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, References to Torture, other characters not mentioned in tags
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-05-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:28:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24306706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Space_Spazz_101/pseuds/Space_Spazz_101
Summary: Carolina had been trapped in the singularity prison. Her friends were imprisoned in their worst fears, facing death as they were tortured, and all she could do was watch as they suffered. When she gets a chance to end her friend's suffering from the enemy she is trying to defeat what does she do? What other choice does she have?
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10





	Carolina's Deal with the Devil

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheParaPhoenix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheParaPhoenix/gifts).



> I hope everyone is safe and well. I know this isn't the next chapter of Train Wreck like I had promised, I'm only half done with it. But this is something I have had in my notes and I wanted to share it.
> 
> This is my first One-shot, even if it might be longer than most of my usual chapters, so let me know what you think.

“You will understand some day.”  
Carolina had dreaded that statement since she was a little girl. Since her father had shut down when they had gotten news that her mom wouldn’t be coming home. That single sentence from her father had echoed in her mind every time she had been invited to sleepovers in grade school, she had heard it when her unit had asked her to go out for drinks with them when she was off duty, she had hear it whispered in the back of her mind in Freelancer when she and York had been trying to be something more than comrades. She had heard it when she had first met the Reds and Blues and again when the Hand of Merope had crashed onto Chorus a lifetime ago. She had finally ignored it on Iris when she had thought she understood what that had meant when her brother sacrificed himself to save those, he- they cared about. Carolina had thought she would be different, she had opened up to people after Epsilon passes instead of closing herself off like her father had.

She shouldn’t have kidded herself; the minute she had the chance to bring him back she took it without hesitation. 

And people had gotten hurt. 

She had only made it worse. Her stubbornness and fear had gotten them into this mess. She had wanted to heal Wash after her desire to bring back someone who was dead had left him injured.

Just like her father with her mom and the project, she had tried to bring back the dead and she had only hurt everyone. But she had tried to make amends, she had tried to undo her damage caused by her choices. Except she had put all of reality in danger as well as all the people she cared about to do it. She ad deemed one person more important than everyone around them, and now all of them would die from her selfishness.

Just like what her father had done.

~~~~~~

“I have a proposition for you my child.”

Carolina had been separated from the others when they had been brought to the Singularity. Everyone else had been trapped in their worst fears, Wash, Tucker, Grif, Sarge, Simmons, Doc, Donut, even Caboose and Lopez were stuck in the Labyrinth. Carolina was in the prison with Chrovos. The two stuck watching as each member of Carolina’s family experienced their worst fears. 

“A proposition...”

Was that what her father had felt when he had been offered to start up Project?

“You can save them all from Genkins. You only have to do one thing to free me and I can save them.”  
*  
Tucker was the first to fall. He collapsed almost a foot from the black hole, nearly toppling down into the abyss as he lost consciousness.  
*  
Was hope what had pushed her father over the edge from the scattered brained, depressed parent he had been all her life to the unfeeling, cold man he had been after she had enlisted and met him again in the Project?

*  
Carolina watched as Doc seemed to completely lose himself to O’Malley, then O’Malley began to scream.  
*  
“All you have to do is follow my directions and I can stop him.”   
*  
Carolina could hear Wash cry out her name along with the others as he battled his worst fears. Each attack brought him closer to the ledge.  
*  
“They won’t last much longer. When they die Genkins will absorb their spirits and energy, they will be lost forever.” Chrovos warned as they watched Lopez stand in front to the edge. Carolina felt herself break as he took a step off the ledge. Carolina turned towards Chrovos, she couldn’t watch anymore, or she would shatter completely.

“He isn’t lost completely; his robotic form is protecting him. You can still save him. You can even save those you lost long ago.” Carolina was fully facing Chrovos now. She knew she had something between despair and hope glittering across her face. Carolina couldn’t bring herself to care as Lopez, Epsilon, and even York flashed in her mind’s eye.

“What?” For the first time Carolina found herself distracted from the tortured cries of her friends, her family as they were faced with their worst fears. While she was stuck here unable to help.

“Lopez, Epsilon, York, even your mother, you can save them all. You only have to listen to me.” Chrovos promised. She was standing very close to the invisible wall that kept her trapped inside the black hole. Chrovos had been staring at Carolina during their entire conversation, it was unnerving. Then another screen sounded.  
Carolina could feel her restraint begin to waver as Grif took another lap, nearly falling into the edge. She didn’t have much time left.

Wash collapsed. Centimeters from the edge, his heavy breathing the only indication he was still alive.

“What do I have to do?”  
Time seemed to stand still as a time gun fell to her feet at her words. Carolina stared. Chrovos spoke, urging her to grab the gun.  
“Genkins forgets that time and space are connected and that both are in my domain even trapped in here and weakened I still have enough power to bring the gun he threw over the edge to me.”  
Carolina took the weapon with shaking hands; she could still hear everyone’s screams, but that was ok. It meant that they were still alive. She could create a paradox and free Chrovos before she lost anyone else. She knew where to go. 

If she stopped Epsilon from shattering then Temple would have to find them, taking him away from attacking the UNSC, from using the device that started this whole mess.  
Carolina had the coordinates set. But she stopped for a second, she had to know, before she doomed all of time and space to rescue the people she loved.

“Why are you helping me? Why are you letting me save them?”

Chrovos seemed to smile at her from behind the helmeted form they took. It was strange, even without seeing Chrovos’ face hidden behind the helmet, Carolina almost felt like she had seen that expression before.  
A long time ago...

“You will understand some day.”

Suddenly Carolina was on Chorus, The Communication Temple was activating, and Epsilon was just starting his speech. She didn’t have much time. She had to finish up and get on the ship with Wash before the others left. Use the Director’s override code to give FILISS control over the ship, and make sure Epsilon lived.

“Come on Lina!” Epsilon called up to her, breaking her out of her brooding. His robotic body was helping Caboose at one of the picnic tables at the bottom of the hill she stood on. Carolina could hear the grin in his voice as he waved at her.  
“If I have to suffer through Arts and Crafts and Flaming Projectiles, then so do you” Epsilon called out to her.

Simmons and Grif were bickering beside the fire, this time about how many jalapeños to put into the chili they were cooking over the open fire. Tucker was at the picnic table with Caboose and Junior doing a craft with Theta sitting on North’s shoulder telling him how to do it. Theta’s robot body was in pieces a few feet away; where Lopez and Sarge were tinkering with the pieces after Caboose had managed to somehow get marshmallows stuck in some of the gear pieces. South, Wyoming, Kaikaina, and Maine were day drinking as they played beanbags near the water. Doc and Donut were off somewhere with the others gathering more fire wood.

“I’m coming, I’m coming!” Carolina called down. Leaving her perch in the tree at the top of the canyon.

As she descended York met her halfway. His matching eyes were looking at her as if she hung the stars in the sky.

Carolina grabbed his hand and kissed York within a ferocity she hadn’t been able to hold back. Had never been able to hold back whenever she thought back to what had been.

“Not that I’m complaining, but what was that for?” York questioned, breathless, both amused and confused as he looked at her. his eyes twinkled. She could hear several others down the hill making gagging noises and there were a few murmurs of “older sisters, blegh” behind them, she ignored them. Maybe she would get back at them, maybe she wouldn’t. “Nothing, your here that’s all that matters.” Was her response because right now this was perfect, and she wouldn’t ever take this for granted again. “Come on, if we let Grif and Simmons continue cooking nobody is going to be able to eat without losing their tongues.” She grabbed his hand and they ran the rest of the way down.

Chrovos may be watching or even planning for her little paradise to shatter but until then she wouldn’t let her past continue to haunt her.  
Carolina ran down the rest of the way hand in hand with York.

Maybe this wasn’t real. Maybe one day she would wake up and be trapped in Temple’s torture chamber with everyone she loved surrounding her dead or maybe she would find herself in a punishment far worse than anything she had ever imagined. But until that day came, she would cherish every moment she had and never want it to end. And if an old enemy returned to take it away, whether Genkins or Temple, or Felix or even her father than she would fight with everything she had to protect the people she loved. Her grip on York’s hand tightened.

She would protect her family.

——————————————————

Chrovos looked out at the party at the bottom of the hill she sat on with a fond expression. The people below completely oblivious of her presence.

She could have had almost anyone free her. Anyone from the UNSC or Sanghelious who wanted the wars changed, had she used them then it would have been more noticeable but harder for the Cosmic Powers to track. Anyone from Chorus who wanted to kill Felix or Locus themselves before the reveal. That could have worked too. Locus wouldn’t have been presented to rescue the reds and blues or perhaps the blues and reds wouldn’t have had the chance to build their device at all. The Blues and Reds would have been even better because they had one point that they would have changed that would have completely rewrote their own history. 

Dr. Lenard Church, the Director, would have been perfect because his intense desire to bring back one woman had simultaneously ended the war and caused all the tragedy that the people at the bottom of the hill had faced in the last decade. He would have been perfect.  
Genkins had told her of all these other options before their plan had begun.  
But no one would have been as perfect as the group below her. 

As she looked downward at the group someone came up behind her and wrapped their arms around her waist. “Are you thinking of leaving again?” The voice of the Freelancer Alpha AI spoke from behind her his voice was mostly curious and accepting. As if he didn’t really care about where she was. But she could feel the truth in her code. That he would miss her if she was gone. “No, I’m thinking that if we don’t hurry all the Food’s going to be gone.” She answers with a slight curve of her lips. As she places her hands over his. They remained like that for a few more minutes, simply enjoying the embrace.

This may be Carolina’s reward for freeing her, everyone she had ever cared about in one place, safe from harm. Free from the manipulations of others. 

But this was Chrovos’ endgame.

Genkins had asked her why it had to be them when he had first approached her on partnering. He had come to her with two dozen possible candidates for time travel shenanigans. 

Chrovos had rejected all of them, instead choosing the group below her to fulfill her needs.

Genkins wasn’t aware of just how tightly woven Chrovos was to this little group. He wasn’t aware of just what Chrovos was willing to do to make sure that they were the ones to free her, of the lengths she would have gone to in order to ensure that this exact scene was playing out before her.

The last time she had tried to free herself. Chrovos had ended up sending her conscious code to be reborn in a human form. That form had become Allison McCallister, then Allison Church and then Commander Church, and then finally the most important title she had ever been given, Mom. Allison had lived and died as a human, with the same worldly attachments and emotions that all humans felt.

Chrovos only regained those memories after Allison had passed on. That had been the most devastating failure. Chrovos hadn’t know if her husband was alive or what had happened to her baby girl. That had been the most agonizing two decades of her existence, even worse than the first few millennia she had spent trapped in the Singularity.

Chrovos had gotten a second chance when Alpha and Beta had been created. But her connection had been limited to Beta and it had been tenuous at best. Beta had gone through so many memory wipes that Chrovos had struggled to direct her even with their codes being so similar to each other that Beta was practically an extension of her own code.

Beta had shown her that Lenard had been broken beyond recognition and her baby had grown up to be almost as broken as her father. That had been hard, but a path to save them had been opened up with the development of a time augmentation unit. It could have destroyed her prison had the idea not been dumped prematurely. But the possibility was there.

Then Carolina had nearly been killed because of the same subroutine that had spawned the first Atlus, that same subroutine that had trapped her for millennia when he began to desired power over living beings instead of the power to guide them. Chrovos had to send her own energy she had amassed over the last twenty years to keep her little girl alive. It had weakened her so much that she had to push all her plans back nearly a decade, but Carolina had survived Sidewinder and the confrontation with the so called ‘Meta.’

Chrovos lost all connection with Beta then. The believed loss of Carolina mad it hard for Chrovos to connect to Beta. Beta believed that what Chrovos tried to tell her was only wishful thinking and disregarded any contact Chrovos made.

But that had been when Beta had found Blood Gulch and the Reds and Blues. Chrovos found herself becoming just as attached to the soldiers as Beta did. She watched them go through their daily lives, helping Alpha and Beta through their pain.

They had come close to ripping time apart when the robot-bomb detonated close to the time augmentation unit. She would have been free had Wyoming been closer to the explosion. But, like Beta, Chrovos was never that lucky.

So, Chrovos watched as the Reds and Blues took care of Alpha after he lost Beta. She watched as they took care of Washington, a small piece of Epsilon’s code had merged itself with his psyche leaving him connected to Chrovos even after Epsilon had been removed and Alpha, Beta, and the other AI returned to her. Chrovos used that connection to watch as they healed Washington and then Carolina. Made sure that they were alright, despite how much they didn’t want the help at times. After Epsilon memories returned to her after his sacrifice, she knew that they were the right people for the job.

That was how the Reds and Blues had gained her favor.

Originally, Chrovos had been planning to have the Blues and Reds break her free. Sending instructions on how to build a time travel device to Loco had been child’s play. But Chrovos hadn’t, initially seen what Temple had wanted to do to her daughter, she had assumed his anger would be aimed towards Beta and his revenge on her. Chrovos hadn’t realized his target had been Carolina until it was too late for her to stop it. His vengeance had been inconceivable to her because BETA had killed his friend, Carolina hadn’t. Chrovos regretted not foreseeing the torture chamber nor Washington being shot; but she had managed to pull Lopez towards her prison easily enough to gain Locus’s attention. From there it had been child’s play to get Locus and Grif to the captured children in time to save their lives. 

Everything was alright now.

Washington was safe since the injury had never happened, Epsilon had taken a cathartic pleasure in making sure that they would not need to deal with the members of the Blues and Reds that still intended their family harm.

Had she gone with her original plan with the Blues and Reds rescuing their friend, she would have gotten free much sooner. But Chrovos had to admit beating Genkins with her bare hands had been cathartic. Genkins had been born from the same subroutine that has created Gamma and Sigma. The subroutine that had nearly killed her daughter. Chrovos had been unable to destroy the impudent originals herself but Genkins had been the next best thing. 

There was also the pain his betrayal had caused, although nothing from the last thirty years, he had been in for the beating she had given him. His fear at her appearance had been invigorating after Carolina had freed her and the others were knocked unconscious by the force of her unbridled rage. Chrovos had recovered the power she had lent him and left him trapped in her prison. Then she had done the same to the other fragments. 

Genkins hadn’t understood her plan, and he had tried to destroy her daughter. ...And Carolina was her first real child, not born from shedding of her code but from her binary code turned into genetic code merging with another to birth a being fundamentally different from the originals.

Much like this version of Epsilon, Delta, and the others. Chrovos had learned from the first two incidences, shedding your code only brought trouble when the fragments began to seek more power.

What Carolina was not aware of was the influence Chrovos had over everything. How she had weaved the threads that made up this small garden so that it reached into the vast cosmos ensuring that her sentinels would stay in power and keep the web safe. 

Santa was on Chorus, ensuring the free will of any leftover pirates did not harm his planet nor his people. Because even if humans were annoying little shits, he still cared more for the ones born on the planet and were willing to protect it, over the people who only wanted to strip it down for parts. After all, in addition to sharing knowledge, he was programmed to protect the children of Chorus. It was a difficult job when the entire human population of planet fell under that category. That code defined by the differences between human and alien biology. 

The thing was Santa LOVED it. Thousands of years of not being in use had left Santa craving usefulness. Working with Chorousans to kill the remaining pirates and then rebuilding the planet promised to provide usefulness to Santa for decades if not centuries to come. Especially as the children tried to shift from a military mindset to one more fitting peace. If he worked carefully he could have as much as 30 percent of Chorus running by himself in addition to his work with keeping Doyle and Kimball from killing each other as they tried to run the planet and keep control of the planet with the Chorousans as they entered talks with the UNSC.

But Santa was just as protective over what he deemed ’his.’ There would be no mercy for the UNSC if they tried to forgo the peace talks and take the planet by force. They would find themselves at a great disadvantage. 

Sheila had taken over a good portion of the UNSC and was doing her best to ensure the safety of humanity across the cosmos.

VIC was doing the same with Sheila and hundreds of other AI all trying to create something close to peace as possible without any ‘intelligent’ beings realizing.  
The old human saying “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” had referred to how dangerous a woman snubbed could be but the Trojan war had nothing on what an A.I. Hellbent on protecting what they saw as theirs could do.

And Chrovos would protect her children. Whether they knew of it or not.

In seventy-years or so Carolina and the rest would pass on as their natural lives ended. Allowing for Chrovos to claim their spirits and ensure they would not disappear again. She had collected Lenard’s spirit long ago. He was healing, after he recovered, he and Alpha would merge and find themselves bonded with her. They had both been vaguely aware of her true powers, in the form of dreams and visions she had sent to them before she had known the fate of her husband. Alpha had been the step to ensure that Lenard would be with her after his natural life ended. The same would happen with the others. They would bond with some distant fragments of her power, essentially being remade but this time without the trauma, their personalities would remain the same but their minds and spirits could fully heal, as had been her plan form the beginning. Carolina and the others would grow knowing that they were loved deeply.

Chrovos finally broke the embrace grabbing Alpha’s hand and began to lead him down the hill in a way reminiscent of Carolina and York. Chrovos had won, her loved ones were safe, and the others would keep them safe if she ever had to leave or if the Cosmic powers began to seek a way out of their prisons.

Chrovos had won, and eternity was good.

**Author's Note:**

> So that was a thing. Please like, comment, and sub.. whoops that's YouTube.  
> I hope everyone who reads this enjoys it. If you feel inspired by this please feel free to use any of these ideas if it gets you going!  
> I will try and have the next chapter of Train Wreck out by the end of the week and hopefully have some more of What IF? out next week.
> 
> Please, forgive me for sounding like a commercial but:  
> Stay safe, stay healthy, and if you can stay home. We will get through this together. <3  
> ~Spazz


End file.
